International

Last week, as part of its new economic governance, the European Commission produced its first report on ‘macro-economic imbalances’. Despite being extremely important, the report gained little attention in the media,. Twelve countries were, in the first instance, picked on to be examined by the Commission regarding matters such as export position, changes in wage levels, pensions, the housing market, and so on. These countries, which don’t include the Netherlands, are now being subjected to a close investigation. The expectation is that they’ll be getting a kick in the pants, and if things are bad enough and too little is done about these imbalances, they’ll be faced with billions in sanctions. So economic governance is now up and running, without anyone having been given the chance to have their say via referenda or elections. Some people will be very happy about this, and that goes for big corporations and the banks, but for ordinary people it’s a sad development.

From the start the SP has opposed economic governance. Prime Minister Mark Rutte may have denied it in so many words, but what we have here is a development by means of which the European Commission will gain far too much influence over our national social and economic policy. Although the Netherlands does not belong to the twelve countries now under investigation, the Commission is nevertheless taking a great interest in our housing market. Rutte claims that the Netherlands won’t get a kick in the pants, but if you take a good look at the Commission’s document, you will see that they will actually be keeping a very close eye on housing. So it seems to me that we can also expect next year to see a more critical report and that the Netherlands will be one of the targets for examination. Rutte has lied to us all, but there’s nothing fresh about that.

Is there then nothing wrong with the housing market? Of course there is, but we don’t need the European Commission in order to discuss this. The SP has already, during the last parliamentary elections, proposed that mortgage relief be limited to a maximum €350,000, a proposal which has since acquired more chance of acceptance, given that within the two governing centre-right parties more questions are being asked regarding what to do about the issue. We can therefore regulate this very well at national level.

Finally, the commission’s report demonstrates the one-sidedness of this economic governance: everything is aimed at ‘competitiveness’. What this means in practice is lower wages and deteriorating conditions of employment. Very little is said about employment or poverty. The commission proceeds from the assumption that via growth the rest will come good, but we know that this isn’t the case. During the boom times too, income differentials grew wider and wages of ordinary workers lagged those of ‘top executives’, while poverty, including that of the working poor, increased. The Commission’s report is thus by definition one-sided and offers no good basis for the member states to address their problems. The European Parliament must then quiz the Commission on social issues, but with a right-wing majority this will be extremely difficult.